1. Field of the Invention
The present invention pertains generally to containers for liquids such as beverages, including carbonated beverages, and cooperating closures for such containers, where the finish of the container includes an internal thread to be cooperatively engaged by the closure.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Conventional containers for liquids such as beverages commonly employ threaded closures. The containers generally have a finish portion surrounding the mouth of the container that includes an external thread for engagement by a closure. The closure is generally of a form that includes a top wall for bridging the mouth of the container and a peripheral skirt including an internal thread engaging the external thread of the container. The external thread of the container may be periodically interrupted to permit safe venting of gases from within the container when the closure is removed therefrom. An engagement ring is typically located a short distance below the external thread of the container for engagement with a tamper-evident band situated at the bottom margin of the skirt of the closure. Upon removal of the closure from the container, the tamper-evident band is intended to be disrupted in one manner or another to present easily recognized visible evidence of prior opening of the container closure. Finally, there is generally situated below the engagement band a support ring that is employed by various container handling equipment during the manufacture and filling of the container.
It will be appreciated that the vertical extent and spacing between the external thread, engagement band, and support ring are subject to some minor variation in design. However, the serial location of these three elements requires some minimum vertical dimension that may be undesirable in certain low aspect ratio containers. It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a container finish and cooperating closure having all three functional elements found in such conventional containers but arranged in a different combination to present a lower and more compact arrangement of elements.